What has been remarkable about the protests that have engulfed the country over the past month isn’t just the scope or even the regularity, but the creativity and novelty of tactics. (Photo by Stephanie Keith/Getty Images)

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Features » February 17, 2017

The Mass Protests of the Anti-Trump Resistance Are Starting to Win. Here’s How.

From the airport protests to work stoppages, Americans are taking dramatic and disruptive actions that have scored real victories.

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Rather than simply asking, “can he do that?” Americans are more and more starting to ask themselves, “can we do that?”

On New Year’s Eve, as then President-elect Donald Trump was hosting a cadre of wealthy elites at his Mar-a-Lago estate in Florida, activist and filmmaker Valarie Kaur took to the pulpit at the historic Metropolitan AME Church in Washington, D.C., to offer words of hope in what to many Americans seemed the most hopeless of moments.

Just two months before, the country had witnessed millions upon millions of its citizens vote for an openly xenophobic and sexist bigot who ran as an authoritarian strongman, vaulting him to become the next U.S. president.

But Kaur, whose Sikh identity makes her more vulnerable than most to Trump’s reactionary policies, was not there to mourn or to wallow. In a speech that has now been viewed more than four million times on Facebook, she instead made the case that this is a moment to seize—an opportunity for transformation.

“What if this darkness is not the darkness of the tomb, but the darkness of the womb? What if our America is not dead but a country that is waiting to be born?” Kaur asked.

Nearly a month into Trump’s presidency, it’s not a stretch to say that we may be witnessing a transformation, one being made in the streets and among the grassroots of America.

The nationwide Women’s March on January 21 was likely the largest demonstration in U.S. history. Since, major cities have been overtaken by daily protests against Trump and the GOP’s agenda.

More mass marches are planned for the coming months, including a March for Science on April 22, the People’s Climate March on April 29 and an Immigrants’ March on May 6. Members of Congress, Republican and Democrat, have had their phone lines, emails, offices and town hall meetings flooded by incensed constituents.

Dozens of grassroots political groups have formed, including the fast-growing Indivisible, focused on citizen lobbying of lawmakers, and Swing Left, founded to support progressive candidates running in 2018. Existing left organizations have seen their memberships swell, perhaps most remarkably the Democratic Socialists of America.

Divestment campaigns such as those targeting investors in the Dakota Access Pipeline are gaining steam, using direct economic pressure to influence policy.

Despite the lack of singular leadership, a protest movement has rapidly developed, one unseen in recent history. It’s showing no signs of slowing—and scoring real victories.

First strikes

One of the most controversial policies of the nascent Trump administration has been the travel ban placed on immigrants and refugees from seven Muslim-majority countries. The protests at airports around the country that followed the announcement of the ban had an immediate effect, pushing the opposition to the front of nightly newscasts, directing massive donations to legal advocacy groups like the ACLU and showing the court system that there was vocal public resistance to the order.

On February 9, the Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals upheld a stay on the order, canceling its effects. The administration has suggested it may take its case to the Supreme Court, where it’s unclear what action the justices would take. And Trump has claimed he may soon introduce a new similar order. But for now, the ban has been overturned.

Many other tangible wins have been scored by the mass resistance to Trump and the GOP majority’s plans. They include dropping an effort to overturn congressional ethics rules, killing plans to sell off over three million acres of federal lands, the withdrawal from consideration for labor secretary by fast food CEO and notorious wage thief Andy Puzder, and much more.

But the resistance to Trump’s agenda hasn’t just reversed plans that were already in place. It has also helped to prevent policies that the administration otherwise would have likely pushed through.

Foremost on this front is the plan to repeal the Affordable Care Act, which Trump promised to take care of on “Day 1,” when on the campaign trail. Instead, repeal efforts have been log jammed with legislators facing intense backlash from their constituents furious over the prospect of losing their care.

There are also the multiple draft executive orders that have been floated and leaked to the press, but not signed. These include further crackdowns on undocumented immigrants, including DREAMERs, and a dramatic rollback of rights for the LGBTQ community. Of course, Trump could still move forward with these orders, but the fact that they have been stalled, if not prevented altogether, is a testament to the power of the growing pushback against such repressive measures.

The new dissent

What has been remarkable about the protests that have engulfed the country over the past month isn’t just the scope or even the regularity, but the creativity and novelty of tactics.

The airport protests brought the human crisis of the Muslim ban straight to the points of entry into the country, transforming what for many had previously been a benign transportation center into a seething political space. And the concurrent taxi driver strike at JFK airport had an immediate effect, showing solidarity through a widespread work stoppage that couldn’t be ignored.

Yemeni bodega workers in New York went on strike across the city this month, with as many as 5,000 people amassing at Brooklyn’s Borough Hall to protest Trump’s immigration policies. And on Thursday, businesses nationwide shut down and thousands demonstrated as part of the “Day Without Immigrants” action, showing the economic power of America’s immigrant population. In both cases, shop owners left messages on their doors explaining to customers why they weren’t at work, connecting their protest directly with daily commerce.

These are but a few examples of the unorthodox actions that have popped up in recent weeks, and many more are set to come. On March 8, a national Women’s Strike is being planned, which has gained the support of the organizers of the Women’s March and has been previewed in outlets ranging from New York magazine to Teen Vogue.

These types of protests have the power to capture the imagination of those not previously involved in political organizing and can inspire them to act. As dissent takes new forms and moves into new spheres of people’s lives, it’s capable of spreading in ways previously unseen.

As the scholar and social movement historian Frances Fox Piven explains in her book Challenging Authority: How Ordinary People Change America:

Ordinary people exercise power in American politics mainly at those extraordinary moments when they rise up in anger and hope, defy the rules that ordinarily govern their daily lives, and, by doing so, disrupt the workings of the institutions in which they are enmeshed.

Whether at airports, schools, places of worship, workplaces or city centers, this may be what we are witnessing now.

Beyond mass action

Of course, the immediate and long-term challenges for those on the left remain vast. This is only the first month of a long four-year slog. On the horizon loom even more extreme measures to step up deportations, further criminalize Muslims, and gut climate regulations, along with a full-blown Republican-led assault on all the progressive gains made in recent years.

And so far this new protest movement has been primarily oppositional, responding to attacks posed by the new government. Any program to win power must also set out a bold vision of a different kind of society, one focused on the needs of working people that serves as a true alternative to the type of racist and corporate-dominated agenda currently being carried out.

If we are to see a “new birth” of this country, it will require not just a common enemy, but common principles and objectives that will advance equality and freedom, guiding the current upsurge of activism from marching in the streets towards implementing progressive policy that cuts to the heart of a fundamentally unequal economic and political system.

Yet, it is becoming clear that the shock of seeing Trump elected president—and shake the foundations of our democracy—has quickly moved beyond outrage into mass, coordinated protest.

Rather than simply asking, “can he do that?” Americans are more and more starting to ask themselves, “can we do that?” This is the form of inventive thinking, awakened by resistance to a demagogic leader, that can begin to chart a new direction. The next steps are up to us.

Miles Kampf-Lassin, a graduate of New York University's Gallatin School in Deliberative Democracy and Globalization, is a Web Editor at In These Times. He is a Chicago based writer.
miles@inthesetimes.com
@MilesKLassin

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Posted by John N. James on 2017-02-28 01:02:49

No, Trump's victory was caused by an equally detested candidate running on the Democratic Party ticket whose campaign squandered a billion dollars and failed to turn out the base after the Democratic primary which exposed cheating for one candidate over another.

Posted by Gihan on 2017-02-25 15:53:03

Sorry, Hillary and the DNC's hubris and arrogance put Trump in the white house. Nothing secret or shadow about that.

Posted by Gihan on 2017-02-25 15:45:59

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Posted by Taylor Henry on 2017-02-24 00:10:44

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Posted by Adam Marshall on 2017-02-23 02:25:57

Attitudes didn't elect Trump. Pure ignorance did. Ignorance in the media who treated him like a monkey on display, instead of the dire threat he is. Ignorance of your kind, thinking he'd rush in, saving you from all those pesky non-whites taking your jobs away.

Trump is the poor man's idea of a rich manTrump is the stupid man's idea of a smart manTrump is the weak man's idea of a strong man

Posted by Fartrell Cluggins on 2017-02-22 15:05:42

Keep getting your "reality" from Fox News. Keep dismissing the movement as nothing, when in reality, it's for respect, inclusiveness and showing what America really stands for. Just because a few anarchists love to show up and cause problems, doesn't mean that's what the movement, the resistance, is about.

Posted by Fartrell Cluggins on 2017-02-22 15:02:37

Is that you, Alex Jones?

Posted by Fartrell Cluggins on 2017-02-22 14:59:24

They call us snowflakes and whiners, but they have no clue what they awakened with their celebration of ignorance. I absolutely love this quote and it nails my thoughts about where we're at right now:

“What if this darkness is not the darkness of the tomb, but the darkness of the womb? What if our America is not dead but a country that is waiting to be born?”

Keep this momentum alive, spread it to others, and starting in 2018, we start flushing the toilet.

Posted by Fartrell Cluggins on 2017-02-22 14:58:33

Great article!

Posted by highesthotliver on 2017-02-22 06:02:54

You're as delusional as he is......

Posted by Jemster on 2017-02-21 22:57:54

I'd respect him if I could find anything at all about him that wasn't cringey and distasteful. I can at least respect Dick Cheney on a dramatic level for being an interesting and sinister supervillain even if I despise everything he did. But like, if Trump were an antagonist in a story, I'd laugh at how unsubtle the writer was being with this obvious strawman character for everything progressive people hate. If I hear him speak, I can barely take him seriously because he sounds so uncertain of everything he says and his words don't really make sense. If I even look at him for too long, I start to get this weird feeling, like there's something uncanny valley about the way his face forms expressions that don't quite... work. And it goes without saying that there's nothing I've ever seen him do that really raised my opinion of him significantly.

It would be great if I could find something to respect about him, but all I can feel is pity, embarrassment, and disgust. Luckily, he doesn't respect anyone, either, so if your theory is correct that puts him, at most, on equal footing with his enemies. I'll just avoid stooping to his level and I should be fine.

Posted by Alex Franklin on 2017-02-21 01:04:05

Trump, I'm a little disappointed in you. Did you think America would go quietly? That we, the people, would not keep fighting you after you "won" your disgusting little farce? I'd say you underestimating us was one of the most insulting things you've done, but your whole existence is an insult to common decency and humanity on such a fundamental level that trying to separate it out into individual offenses is pointless.

No, you underestimating us does not come close to the worst thing you've done or been, but it WILL be the last thing you do, and a failed dictator will be the last thing you are. We will make your name so synonymous with failure that future generations won't understand the rules of card games.

Posted by Alex Franklin on 2017-02-21 00:23:25

This article goes along with something a friend of mine said: "Instead of getting angry, why not look at the positive aspects of Trump being elected." "There is nothing positive about it", I replied. "Oh, yes there is", he said. "People have been indifferent and inactive regarding our government. They have failed to vote and express their opinions. It has taken a man like Trump to wake up those sleepy bystanders, to get them off the couch and to express themselves." Like the article says: This may be the birth of America. People getting informed and taking action. My mindful friend had a point.

Posted by Veronica von Bernath Morra on 2017-02-20 21:34:21

Look, whether you love or hate Trump, its that very attitude that caused his victory and will keep Trump going from strength to strength. If you want to have even a hope of winning start respecting your opponent.

BS! Trump won't be here in 2020 -- he might be in jail or hospitalized due to being deranged with Alzheimer's. He's impotent and looney-tunes ya know..

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Posted by donald.downs@mail.ru on 2017-02-20 04:17:37

This is a beautifully written article! Thank you so much for sharing. #resistance and remember Yes we can!

Posted by Catherine Joyner on 2017-02-20 03:52:18

Our pleasure, angie497. Yesterday, we did it again, this time $250 for Chesapeake Climate Action Network,'thanks' to Scott Pruitt. Next week, it will be the turn of the International Rescue Committee. Like I said, everybody can do something..be creative!

Posted by Pete on 2017-02-19 19:21:49

That's awesome, Pete - thank you! As a PP volunteer, I can promise you that your contribution will be put to good use!

Posted by angie497 on 2017-02-19 17:02:22

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Posted by jennifer.hight@mail.ru on 2017-02-19 07:24:15

The thing about a strike is that only the working class can carry out a strike. The mere fact of strikes happening means the working class is protesting, not sneering.

Posted by Eli Sennesh on 2017-02-18 21:42:36

The protests are accomplishing nothing. The working class and actual Americans look at them and see a madness. The moment Lena Dunham and foreigners breaking the law to be here became the face of the Democratic party the more assured Trump is of victory in 2020.

Posted by Jew613 on 2017-02-18 18:25:28

Wonder if the shadow secret government put Trump in the oval office so his signature would give them the right to do whatever evil thing they planned?----- and if angry people did anything to harm Trump blame another to create another war, like 9/11 did?Stir up the people, divide them, eliminate the leader for complete control?...isn't this what has happened in the Middle East?

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Posted by joshua.beard@mail.ru on 2017-02-18 05:31:23

Everybody can do something. The day after all those anti-Planned Parenthood protests, i got together with a bunch of old-time string band musicians & busked on the street for PP. We raised $604 in 2 1/2 hours.